Liability Issues Create Potholes on the Road to Driverless Cars

By

Dan Strumpf

Updated Jan. 27, 2013 8:10 p.m. ET

Arizona lawmakers last year were debating a law laying out guidelines for an up-and-coming technology: self-driving vehicles. Then they got to a question they couldn't steer around: Who is to blame if a driverless car gets in a wreck?

When there is no driver, the answer turns complicated, and the possible targets of lawsuits expand. Is it the company that designed the technology? The car's owner, or a passenger who should have assumed...